How does your Garden Grow?

I was at a function last night in aid of Scotland's Garden Scheme and I was asked by several people how does our garden grow? Well, actually it's not bad! But did I say that?  "No" I launched into a description about everything that I thought was wrong!

The list included the gaps in the borders, the plants that didn't manage to overwinter, the lack of rain,  And yet really it's looking good enough this early in the year. Have a look....

 Allium on the point of bursting open. There are a large number in pots for filling in the  gaps in the borders or for cut flowers.

 One of many buds on the quince tree waiting to open . Hope we have as many fruit.

 My favourite rose Canary Bird smothered in blossom.

 The tree fern frond tentatively unfurling.

The delicate nodding head of a semi-aquilegia flower.

The cardiocrinum and the shuttlecock ferns intermingle in the shade border.

 The ornamental garden taken from the house with part of the reproductive garden beyond.

So this is the question for today. How does your garden grow? (And the subtext is "are you a bit more positive then me"?)

Cluny House Gardens

Cluny House gardens is in Perthshire Scotland was planted and developed from 1950 by the owners Bobby and Betty Masterton.It is now managed by their daughter Wendy and her husband John Mattingly.

It has many exotic trees and shrubs mixed with native plants to create a unique woodland garden. Many of the woodland plants spread freely under a canopy of rhododendrons, acers, rowans and birches. There are many Tibetan Cherry trees originally from Bhutan. We have one of the trees in our garden which we bought as a seedling from Cluny. The other tree of note is a giant sequoia which is over 130 year old. If you ever wanted to hug a tree this is the one !

 

Cluny is on a hillside and this creates steep paths and steps meandering through the garden.You have to be fairly fit but help is at hand.

The garden is organically cultivated. Copious amounts of leaf mould are made which is spread around the plants after hand weeding. This helps plants to naturalise and spread.

 This is also a red squirrel habitat and they are easy to spot  and seem unconcerned by human visitors.

April is a good month to see the many different woodland bulbs including trilliums and erythroniums. Primulas are in flower and the first shuttlecock ferns are beginning to unfurl. The slightly sinister arisaemas are  coming up in shady corners and mecanopsis are getting ready for their show towards the end of May. Cardiocrinum seedlings at various stages of growth are much in evidence with their large shiny leaves. The seed heads from last year are left to tower above the seedlings.

Come with me for a wander through this woodland paradise......

A Preview of a Special Garden........

The view from the entrance to this garden in rural Perthshire.  At this time of year it is full of many  shade plants ranging from the delicate such as mecanopsis  x cookei

to the exquisite such as uvullaria grandiflora

 to the weird and slightly sinister arisaema griffithi (I'm not sure about the name so please don't quote me..)

I took a lot of photos so it may take some time to sort out the best of the rest and compose a narrative about the garden for my next post. In the meantime enjoy the photos.

Is it time......

 For the chop? There's nothing worse in a garden than sad looking plants! The phormium for example looks very bedraggled and although an attempt was made to tidy it up, new growth is very limited. The harsh winter has obviously hit it for six. The astelias, the fatsia japonica and the palm are all in the same state. Will they have recovered sufficiently for the Open Garden on July 3rd? That is the question.

But there is hope. The two melianthus major(Honey bushes) have shoots on them. The mulching over the winter seemed to work. I may have to extend it next year to a lot of other plants.

 

Anyway, hope everyone is having a good holiday and happy egg rolling!

Composting Magic

In spite of my best efforts, two enormous bins (built from the old fence) and a smaller plastic job we never seem to have enough compost. Well, you never can have enough of the crumbly brown stuff can you?

Nearly all the garden waste goes into the compost apart from the really tough woody stuff. Our shredder long since gave up the ghost and hiring one wasn't a roaring success (see http://planticrunotes.blogspot.com/search/label/Shredders ) So unless we can find another use for it such as plant supports the tough woody stuff goes into the green bin and off to the council municipal composter.

Our compost bin is filled with layers of garden and kitchen waste, grass cuttings from friends, cardboard and best of all the chicken manure. The bedding is made form all the shredded household paper. And there is a lot of that. I thought computers were supposed to mean less paper not more!

Our bins do heat up quite a bit in the summer when a lot goes into them but is much cooler the rest of the time. The whole process takes between 6 months and a year to complete. In the past it's been used mainly in the vegetable garden, improving the structure of a sandy soil and in trenches for peas, beans and potatoes.

This year I'm sieving the compost to mulch the flower borders. We've never had enough to do that in the past and ended up buying in a mulch which is very expensive. I'm doing a small bit of the garden at a time so that I can examine all the seedlings.  There is an abundance of  astrantia, hellebore and verbena bonariensis. But there maybe some other, very special seedlings such as cardiocrinum giganteum and these take time to find.

After the compost has been sieved the bits that haven't rotted down are used to start a new heap.

 

The end result is this fine crumbly stuff.  The only downside of this maybe that it's full of weed seeds and I'm unknowingly spreading them all round the garden..........

Tulip Fever

In an auction held in Holland in February 1637, 99 lots of tulip bulbs fetched a staggering 90,000 guilders, more than six million pounds in today's money. This was known as Tulipmania. It was a form of futures trading, as people purchased tulip bulbs at increasingly inflated prices with the hope that they would flower into the unusual range of colours.The variety of colour  is produced by a small parasitic aphid, which weakens the plant.

This fascinating period is well documented by Anna Pavord in her book "The Tulip" . There is a fictional account in  "Tulip Fever" by Deborah Moggach. Both are worth reading.

Earth Day

 Earth Day 2011

I am observing Earth Day 2011 by making a small change in the way we live our lives. We've never quite bitten the bullet and changed all our light bulbs to eco friendly ones.The more ordinary lights were not a problem to change but up until now we couldn't get ones that fitted the chandeliers (sounds like we live in a mansion - we don't) but now we can. Time to make that investment......

I'm also going to give the Green Party my second vote in the forth coming Scottish elections.

We do not inherit the earth from our ancestors, we borrow it from our children.  ~Native American Proverb

Wild flower walks

When we go walks with the dog we always take our cameras. The woodland walks are full of interest at all times of the year. At the moment  there is an abundance of wild flowers, such as the wood anemone pictured below. The form a carpet of small white flowers under the trees.

 The very pretty common dog violet.

The flower of the blaeberry (wild blueberry) that we collect later in the year.

The delicate bloom of the wood sorrel. It can be found in abundance in local woods. The petals look as if they have been painted with the most delicate mauve veins.

The Great Highland Plant Hunt

Loch Ness

 Above the clouds at Torran, Loch Ness

  We've been away up north for a few days break. Inevitably that includes a bit of plant retail therapy. The area round Loch Ness is a place we visited for many years ( no sign of any monsters when I remember to look!) and is the home to some of the best plant places. Most of them as nurseries as many  grow their own plants and don't carry the endless tatt associated with many garden centres.

 These are the goodies we bought...

And these are the places we bought them....

Highland Liliums on the way to Beauly. If it wasn't so well sign posted it would be very difficult to find. Great selection of plants, well laid out and so inviting. Not expensive but good quality plants. Visit their site at :http://www.highlandliliums.co.uk/

Ardfearn Nursery founded by plant hunter Jim Sutherland and run with his son Alistair. This is the first nursery that I had ever come across using an impressive drip watering system. Their plants are always in great condition with no weeds. They specialise in alpines. the lastes addition to the centre is a coffe shop which was very welcome. You can find them at:http://www.ardfearn-nursery.co.uk/

We saved our old favourite Abriachan until last. We visited very early in the morning on our way home. The garden is wonderful wending it's way up the hillside above Loch Ness. I'm sure they've added quite a bit since we last visited. The sales area is also very tempting and there is an extensive range of auriculas. (I forgot to photograph the display in my haste to buy) See their site at: http://www.lochnessgarden.com/